Seen but not heard: overweight women discuss their experiences with doctors

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Few doubt that overweight people -- women particularly -- are often treated differently (read worse) than slimmer folks. When it comes to healthcare, that treatment may be troubling to the point of being stressful, a struggle, causing women to feel embarrassed.

Researchers at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock interviewed eight overweight women ages 20 to 61 to learn about their experiences with the healthcare system, then published their findings in this month’s Journal of Advanced Nursing. During interviews about their experiences, four themes became apparent: struggling to fit in, feeling not quite human, being dismissed, and refusing to give up.

Although they are a small sample, the women’s stories recounted in the study are compelling. Said one woman, ‘I had to wait like a half an hour just for them to get my blood pressure because they had the wrong cuff. So then they had to go looking for the other one.…The nurse was running around the office, ‘We need the bigger cuff. She can’t fit the other,’ and I was just like, ‘Oh, my gosh!’ ‘

Said another, ‘When I was delivering my son … I think I weighed 215 pounds when he was born and I just felt huge.… I can remember in the delivery room the doctor saying something to me … during the birthing process. He said, ‘Just relax and just envision yourself on a beach like a big ole whale beached.’ … That hurt me so much because already I felt big.’

Some women talked about doctors not really listening to their weight loss questions and concerns. According to one woman, ‘But they [doctors] are not listening when I say … that I don’t drink soda and I don’t eat fast food … that I don’t do that, I do this. I feel like they are not listening. They don’t care. It’s like they are too busy to stop and listen.’

Others recounted times when they were written off by healthcare providers when trying to discuss non-weight-related health issues. One woman said, ‘I had heard they could do wonders with arthritis.… I went to a chiropractic doctor and he had me fill out a questionnaire and everything and took my weight and my measurements and took one look at me and said, ‘All you need to do is lose weight, and that would solve all your problems.’ He didn’t bother with X-rays or an examination or anything (laugh), so it was amazing to me that he could know that just from reading over the questionnaire and looking at me. I weighed 230 pounds. The time it would take me to lose 80 pounds or so to get within a normal weight range –- am I supposed to suffer all that time?’

Despite such treatment, some of the women continued to look for doctors who would listen to them. One found another internist after this encounter: ‘The doctor said, ‘Well, your blood pressure is high. You need to lose weight’. And I said, ‘I realize that.’ He said, ‘Well, you just have to stop eating.’ And I said, ‘If it would have been easy for me, I would have done it a long time ago.’ And he said, ‘Well, you just need to learn how to do that.’ And so to me it was like an impasse.… I walked out of there, and he told me what I needed to do, and I thought, ‘The hell I will!’ (laugh).… So just because he treated me so pathetically, like I was just a nothing, so I changed internists.’

‘It is vital that healthcare providers tackle the issues raised by overweight women as latest figures show that a third of women in the USA are obese,’ lead author Emily Merrill, associate professor in the school of nursing, said via a release. ‘Research also shows that women may delay or avoid healthcare if providers have reacted negatively to them because of their weight.’

-- Jeannine Stein